ACT Expo held its second annual “Fleet Only” session this year to enable peer-to-peer sharing in an environment that met candor with helpful feedback and an unparalleled sense of empathy. This year has definitely been one for the books, and it most certainly has altered some of the short-term, immediate plans for fleets. However, the long-term plans and focus don’t look all that different from last year: commitment to doing things that improve operations, increase efficiency, reduce cost, and reduce environmental footprints.
We started off the session asking two simple questions to our panel: what were your priorities in 2024 and how do they look today? Fleet leaders from Walmart, Ryder, Turner Construction, American Honda, and PepsiCo described their actions and focus during this period of rapid change. Following brief remarks from each, the room discussed the following set of questions in small groups:
- How are you managing short term vs. long term goals?
- What powertrains and fuels are you using or considering? Why?
- How are you incorporating software-based solutions into your operations?
- What have you seen so far at ACT Expo that you would like to take back to your organization and accomplish for results?
So, with the 200 fleet leaders in the room, what were common themes that emerged?
- Renewable fuels, especially renewable diesel and renewable natural gas, are going to play a larger role in the immediate future.
- Fleets are still extremely interested in electric vehicles, but they don’t feel like they have to rush the process now. The removal of some of the immediate requirements on zero-emission means that these fleets can and will be taking a more thoughtful approach to electrification, especially ensuring that suppliers and technologies are reliable before purchasing in bulk.
- Fleets are monitoring how partners manage change to ensure they remain intact and to service their products next year! These are hard lessons following high profile bankruptcies of several startups in the past year.
- Artificial intelligence is not just for the future, but has current and immediate uses. Fleets are actively figuring out ways and approaches to incorporate AI more effectively, especially in route optimization and maintenance.
The fleet-only session had a very different feeling this year than last year. It echoed what I think has been a theme coming out of ACT 2025: the journey to sustainability is not a straight road to one technology but instead a varied yet steady path to doing better each year using a portfolio approach.
ACT is and has always been a show for fleets, by fleets, and we look forward to continuing to convene sessions like this at ACT and through our ACT Fleet Forum to enable dialogue that propels the industry forward.
